"You were acting like a mind-controlled."
Thorvald stared at him incredulously, then with a growing spark of interest.
"The minute you dripped water on that thing you changed," Shann continued.
Thorvald reholstered his stunner. "Yes," he mused, "why did I want to drip water on it? Something prompted me...." He ran his still damp hand up the angle of his jaw, across his forehead as if to relieve some pain there. "What else did I do?"
"Faced to the sea and said 'that way,'" Shann replied promptly.
"And why did you move in to stop me?"
Shann shrugged. "When I first touched that thing I felt a shock. And I've seen mind-controlled——" He could have bitten his tongue for betraying that. The world of the mind-controlled was very far from the life Thorvald and his kind knew.
"Very interesting," commented the other. "For one of so few years you seem to have seen a lot, Lantee—and apparently remembered most of it. But I would agree that you are right about this little plaything; it carries a danger with it, being far less innocent than it looks." He tore off one of the fluttering scraps of rag which now made up his sleeve. "If you'll just remove your foot, we'll put it out of business for now."
He proceeded to wrap the disk well in his bit of cloth, taking care not to touch it again with his bare fingers while he stowed it away.
"I don't know what we have in this—a key to unlock a door, a trap to catch the unwary. I can't guess how or why it works. But we can be reasonably sure it's not just some carefree maiden's locket, nor the equivalent of a credit to spend in the nearest bar. So it pointed me to the sea, did it? Well, that much I am willing to allow. Maybe we'll be able to return it to the owner, after we learn who—or what—that owner is."